1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to an air conditioner (indoor unit) having a function of automatically cleaning a filter and, more particularly, relates to an air conditioner which casing is miniaturized by improving the moving path of the filter.
2. Related Art
For example, as shown in a patent document 1, some types of the indoor units of recent air conditioners have a filter cleaning function for automatically removing dust adhered to a filter.
In general, the filter cleaning function is realized in a manner that there are provided with a filter attached to a main body cabinet so as to cover an air intake port and a cleaning unit for collecting dust adhered to the filter, whereby the filter is moved within the cleaning unit to thereby collect dust adhered to the filter by the cleaning unit.
There has been another type in which the filter cleaning is realized by moving the filter or the cleaning unit. In the case of moving the cleaning unit, the sizes of the moving space of the unit and a driving motor thereof becomes large. Thus, the air conditioner more reduced in the cost and size thereof can be realized in the case of fixing the cleaning unit and driving the filter.
The air conditioner described in the patent document 1 is configured in a manner that the filter cleaning device thereof is disposed in a space between a front side heat exchanger and a front panel and the filter to be moved makes a U-turn so that the filter can be moved efficiently within a limited space.
However, the filter cleaning device described in the patent document 1 is configured to provide a detour lane dedicated for the U-turn so as to realize the U-turn of the filter within the casing, so that the space for the detour lane is additionally required.    [Patent Document 1] JP-A-2007-100975